Personal Assistant (Abu Dhabi, UAE)

Salary TBC,

We are looking to recruit a junior personal assistant to provide professional legal support to our fee earners and general administrative support to ensure smooth operations in our Abu Dhabi office. The key responsibilities of this role relate to office operations and personal assistant duties.

It is important to note that there are peaks and troughs in workload of the role where not all those tasks outlined are applicable on a daily or weekly basis. Some are ad-hoc tasks as and when they occur to meet business requirements (e.g., office maintenance, support with events, proposals, client meetings, etc.)

Key responsibilities and deliverables

Office Operations

1. Ensures office and client meeting spaces are kept clean, fully stocked, and well maintained.
2. Handle catering requests for meetings. Liaison with suppliers and contractors to ensure service standards are met.
3. Maintain balanced petty cash for the office.
4. Prepares payment requests for general office services.
5. Controls stationary inventory and deals with vendors to place orders when necessary.
6. Delivering, collecting, and distributing documents and post.
7. Negotiate corporate rates with local hotels and apartments and arrange bookings.
8. Coordinate local logistics and transportation for visitors.
9. Assists with organising office delivery Gate Passes for suppliers with ADGM facility managers.
10. Assists with issuing and logging office access cards as well as prepares applications for lift and parking permits with ADGM facility managers as necessary.
11. Provides administrative support to Office Manager and business services teams in MENA as required. Contributes to support office/team projects on an ad hoc basis.

Office Reception

1. Answers phone calls through the reception, directs as appropriate, and takes accurate messages.
2. Greets and farewells clients in a friendly and professional manner and escorts them to the boardrooms. Sets up and services refreshment requirements and ensures the room is checked on a regular basis during meetings and assists with cleaning when required.
3. Manages incoming and outgoing couriers and deliveries and arranges distribution in a timely manner. Tracks outgoing packages to ensure receipt. Allocates fees to the appropriate cost code or client as per office procedures.

PA responsibilities

Client engagement

1. Responds to, assesses, and prioritises clients’ requests, however communicated, and offers appropriate efficient and business-like help and assistance to meet their needs.
2. Maintains a good knowledge of current matters and carries out client liaison duties including regular WIP updates.
3. Develops and maintains an up-to-date knowledge of the stage of the matter upon which the fee earners are working, current matter workloads, potential issues, and sensitivities.

Marketing and Business Development activities

1. Proactively supports fee earners’ MBD responsibilities. Includes submitting content to MBD systems (CV database, pitch/experience lists, etc.), intranet/LinkedIn publishing, prompting fee earners to provide material for uploading, conducting basic research on potential clients, running regular activity, and tracking reports to support MBD initiatives.
2. Carries out basic business development duties such as updating contacts and sending out business development materials.
3. Assists with administrative support for both internal and external business development and client events, working in conjunction with the relevant central and practice-based MBD teams as appropriate.
4. Support the MBD department as required on the production of pitches, client presentations, and maintaining up-to-date CVs for fee earners.

General administrative support

1. Helps to manage incoming communication (including fee earners’ e-mail), drafts and transcribes replies when directed by fee earners, and ensures all mail is processed in an accurate and timely manner.
2. Pro-actively manages fee earners’ diaries, makes appointments, arranges meeting rooms, and organises travel arrangements and expense claims to ensure all work activities are scheduled effectively. Able to make reasoned decisions when conflicts occur, or know when to refer to fee earner for the decision.
3. Arranges all travel effectively and efficiently. This must include understanding fee earners’ preferences, anticipating additional requirements (accommodation, currency, returns, transfers), and planning in contingency.
4. Types letters, correspondence, and legal documentation (often involving confidential material). Proofreads all work to ensure that completed documents are delivered accurately and to an appropriately high standard.
5. Establishes and maintains a robust electronic filing system and other administration systems (such as client files if required) to ensure completeness and accuracy of technical, professional, and matter information. Uses Worksite for e-mail filing as per departmental standards.
6. Carries out day-to-day administrative tasks to ensure provision of high quality service in all areas, including liaison with department business centres and other service departments as appropriate.
7. Assists fee earners with basic technical queries allowing them to make best use of available IT and KBD resources. Ensures own knowledge of technical packages is up to date.
8. Assists with administration, co-ordination, and logistics for internal seminar and training events, ensuring relevant events are diarised for fee earners.
9. Carries out risk checks, matter openings, and draft engagement letters.
10. Assists fee earners with the billing processes, preparing first drafts of bill narratives and managing process of sending bills end-to-end.
11. Provides fee earners with appropriate support in managing personal matters, such that fee earners are able to focus their time on providing efficient services to clients.

Key requirements (Communication/skills/experience)

Essential

1. Administrative support experience
2. English at business fluent level
3. Excellent communication skills (written and oral)
4. Friendly and helpful customer service approach
5. Good organisational skills and attention to detail
6. Ability to prioritise and act on own initiative
7. Able to work fast to tight deadlines
8. Able to work as part of a team
9. Ability to adopt a flexible and proactive approach and retain a professional attitude under pressure
10. Flexibility to work in evenings and/or weekends as required
11. Excellent IT Skills, including fast, accurate audio and copy typing (60 wpm)
12. Able to produce high quality Word and PowerPoint documents
13. Able to create, manipulate, and interrogate Excel spreadsheets
14. Experience in using FileSite, Intapp, WorkDay, SalesForce, IntroHive, or industry equivalent
15. Willingness to broaden experience and develop skills further
16. Willingness to work overtime and/or outside of normal working hours as required

Desirable

1. Valid UAE driver’s license
2. Formal legal secretarial qualification
3. Experience working in a legal environment
4. Competent in Arabic language is an advantage